Viper Racing... Attempt at a review. (long)

Greetings, Lets see if I can do a competent review of this game. Overall it's a great game. It's sort of like an arcade racer wrapped around a very realistic driving model. It looks like arcade but drives like a sim. The main interface is simple. As is the garage and paint shop. A few clicks is all it takes to get into the action. The garage isnt quite as complex as other sims I've seen, but still offers plenty of adjustments. There's aerodymanics, shock and spring settings, camber, toe, gear ratios, final drives and more. The only thing it might lack for the serious sim racer (which I am not) is individual wheel adjustments. You can only adjust front and rear settings. I suppose for the oval tracks you might want to adjust all four wheels different, but its fine for me. All of the adjustments are broken into catagories and accesible by tabs on one page. A rather neat feature is this window that shows in real time how the adjustments you're making are going to affect your car. Take away front spoiler and it shows that what you are doing is going add 'push' to your car. From the garage, you can instantly go to the track to test your adjustments. The paint kit is pretty impressive. For the artists, it has a nice free hand section and for the not-so artistic it has 20 or so templates where you can change the colors. Decals and numbers are also available to add to your car. The career mode is just great. There are four classes to race in. You start in amatuer and work your way up by winning the point championship at the end of each season. Along the way you earn money (the better you finish the better the purse) and can put that money toward upgrades. The upgrades are as simple and cheap as a performance muffler up to ported cyllinder heads and fuel injection systems. The class you're racing in determines what upgrades are available. (Tip for begginers: go for the tires first) You dont have to win every race to advance to the next class, you just have to win the points race (again the better you finish the more points you get). It took me four seasons to gradutate out of the amatuers and eight seasons I think to make it to the pro class. There are (I think) eight tracks all of which can be ran backwards for 16 total. Two tracks are ovals the rest are road courses. The terrain for the road courses range from fertile green to parched desert. They are slighty reminescent (sp?) of Need for Speed tracks. No walls though, you can drive anywhere on or off the tracks. Some are wide and fast, others tight and narrow with lots of elevation changes. For me each track is a challenge and requires a good line and proper car setup to be able drive fast. Graphically the game is quite good. I wouldnt say absolutely stunning but very good. The sounds are pretty decent and useful when determining if you're pushing your car close to or over the 'edge'. Physics! This is where the game shines. They are simply fantastic. I've never driven a Viper (or any car at 180mph+) but it seems right on. You can get loose and save it and you can get loose and lose it. With precise throttle and steering you can even use it to your advantage. It's quite incredible. Watching replays of your car is fun and informative. You can see the front end dip when you shift and the chassis roll in high speed corners. Outstanding! AI... Im still not sure what to think of this yet. The AI drivers are fast and drive good lines. I've lost more than one race though due to their aggresiveness. They do crash and do so realistically and on occassion I've seen them react to me. One example is, I had one guy on my ass for almost two laps. It made me quite nervous, I was afraid he would take me out. Well, one corner I got a little wide and he stuck his nose down underneath me. "Its all over" I thought, he's gonna spin me. It was a right hand corner and he was on my inside and a bit behind me. I held my line and since I had his 'exit' covered he actually had to get out of the gas to avoid drifting up into me and lost his momentum and fell quite a ways back because of it. Other times though I swear they drive like I'm not even there and just hammer into me. I've learned though that alot of crashes are your own fault by not driving a smooth fast line. I suppose they dont have time to react to your poor driving and a crash is the result. Anyway the AI at first seems lacking but the more I watch them the more intelligent they seem. Hmm... did I leave anything out? Multiplayer I've not tried yet so I cant comment on that. I'll go on to my beefs with the game which arent many and pretty petty. Oh one other thing I forgot, there's a clutch! I've never seen a clutch in a driving game before. It very hard since I dont have a third pedal or an easy to reach button on my T2 wheel. I tried but much like when I first tried a manual shift so many years ago its very tricky. Ok, first complaint is after driving in career mode and building up my Viper to the monster it is now, going back to a 'quick' race and a stock Viper is a drag. I'm curious how multiplayer works in this regard. I can see how in multiplayer you'd probably want everyone on the same playing field as far as their car goes though. Next is the shadows on some of the courses. They are just painted onto the road it seems. A fantastic example of good shadows is the SBK Superbike demo. Now those are shadows! MGI, check out that demo and see how they're done. My last complaint is the lack of a 'sense of speed'. It just doesnt seem quite right to me. There's one track in particular that has a series of very tight S's. The first time I went through them I felt like I was doing 15mph, I looked at my spedo and it said 65! It certainly didnt look like I was doing 65. Anyway, there's my thoughts on the game. I give it a 9 outa 10. Great! Fantastic! Love it! Thanks MGI! Sierra: you're lucky you have these guys writing for you. -Cota Disclaimer: Im not an english teacher and I didnt check grammar, spelling, or punctuation!

My other problem with the game was the mirror. It's too small, there are some serious blind spots. I'd like to see maybe a wider view in the mirror or one of those mirrors that are broke into sections where I could a little more to the side of me. Maybe something like that could be put in a patch? -Cota

Thats what the AI says about me :-) They especially hate it when on the 6th corner of castlegreen i always come out 20-30mph faster and knock them off the road into trees (usually taking me with em)

Great review. I don't have my full copy yet but just from the demo these are a few things I'd like to see in a patch. 1. higher resolution support past 1024x768 2. ability to add more cars 3. ability to adjust your Field Of View ( to help the sense of speed) 4. a frame rate counter cheat code 5. ability to look back 6. shorter tracks?? (not sure on this one but from what ppl say the tracks are really long in Viper) If you like my ideas send them to MGI!!!!!!! The more emails they get the more

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> Greetings, > Lets see if I can do a competent review of this game. Overall it's a > great game. It's sort of like an arcade racer wrapped around a very > realistic driving model. It looks like arcade but drives like a sim. > The main interface is simple. As is the garage and paint shop. A few > clicks is all it takes to get into the action. The garage isnt quite as > complex as other sims I've seen, but still offers plenty of adjustments. > There's aerodymanics, shock and spring settings, camber, toe, gear ratios, > final drives and more. The only thing it might lack for the serious sim > racer (which I am not) is individual wheel adjustments. You can only adjust > front and rear settings. I suppose for the oval tracks you might want to > adjust all four wheels different, but its fine for me. All of the > adjustments are broken into catagories and accesible by tabs on one page. A > rather neat feature is this window that shows in real time how the > adjustments you're making are going to affect your car. Take away front > spoiler and it shows that what you are doing is going add 'push' to your > car. From the garage, you can instantly go to the track to test your > adjustments. > The paint kit is pretty impressive. For the artists, it has a nice free > hand section and for the not-so artistic it has 20 or so templates where you > can change the colors. Decals and numbers are also available to add to your > car. > The career mode is just great. There are four classes to race in. You > start in amatuer and work your way up by winning the point championship at > the end of each season. Along the way you earn money (the better you finish > the better the purse) and can put that money toward upgrades. The upgrades > are as simple and cheap as a performance muffler up to ported cyllinder > heads and fuel injection systems. The class you're racing in determines what > upgrades are available. (Tip for begginers: go for the tires first) You dont > have to win every race to advance to the next class, you just have to win > the points race (again the better you finish the more points you get). It > took me four seasons to gradutate out of the amatuers and eight seasons I > think to make it to the pro class. > There are (I think) eight tracks all of which can be ran backwards for 16 > total. Two tracks are ovals the rest are road courses. The terrain for the > road courses range from fertile green to parched desert. They are slighty > reminescent (sp?) of Need for Speed tracks. No walls though, you can drive > anywhere on or off the tracks. Some are wide and fast, others tight and > narrow with lots of elevation changes. For me each track is a challenge and > requires a good line and proper car setup to be able drive fast. > Graphically the game is quite good. I wouldnt say absolutely stunning but > very good. The sounds are pretty decent and useful when determining if > you're pushing your car close to or over the 'edge'. > Physics! This is where the game shines. They are simply fantastic. I've > never driven a Viper (or any car at 180mph+) but it seems right on. You can > get loose and save it and you can get loose and lose it. With precise > throttle and steering you can even use it to your advantage. It's quite > incredible. Watching replays of your car is fun and informative. You can see > the front end dip when you shift and the chassis roll in high speed corners. > Outstanding! > AI... Im still not sure what to think of this yet. The AI drivers are fast > and drive good lines. I've lost more than one race though due to their > aggresiveness. They do crash and do so realistically and on occassion I've > seen them react to me. One example is, I had one guy on my ass for almost > two laps. It made me quite nervous, I was afraid he would take me out. Well, > one corner I got a little wide and he stuck his nose down underneath me. > "Its all over" I thought, he's gonna spin me. It was a right hand corner and > he was on my inside and a bit behind me. I held my line and since I had his > 'exit' covered he actually had to get out of the gas to avoid drifting up > into me and lost his momentum and fell quite a ways back because of it. > Other times though I swear they drive like I'm not even there and just > hammer into me. I've learned though that alot of crashes are your own fault > by not driving a smooth fast line. I suppose they dont have time to react to > your poor driving and a crash is the result. Anyway the AI at first seems > lacking but the more I watch them the more intelligent they seem. > Hmm... did I leave anything out? Multiplayer I've not tried yet so I cant > comment on that. I'll go on to my beefs with the game which arent many and > pretty petty. Oh one other thing I forgot, there's a clutch! I've never seen > a clutch in a driving game before. It very hard since I dont have a third > pedal or an easy to reach button on my T2 wheel. I tried but much like when > I first tried a manual shift so many years ago its very tricky. > Ok, first complaint is after driving in career mode and building up my > Viper to the monster it is now, going back to a 'quick' race and a stock > Viper is a drag. I'm curious how multiplayer works in this regard. I can see > how in multiplayer you'd probably want everyone on the same playing field as > far as their car goes though. Next is the shadows on some of the courses. > They are just painted onto the road it seems. A fantastic example of good > shadows is the SBK Superbike demo. Now those are shadows! MGI, check out > that demo and see how they're done. My last complaint is the lack of a > 'sense of speed'. It just doesnt seem quite right to me. There's one track > in particular that has a series of very tight S's. The first time I went > through them I felt like I was doing 15mph, I looked at my spedo and it said > 65! It certainly didnt look like I was doing 65. > Anyway, there's my thoughts on the game. I give it a 9 outa 10. Great! > Fantastic! Love it! Thanks MGI! Sierra: you're lucky you have these guys > writing for you. > -Cota > Disclaimer: Im not an english teacher and I didnt check grammar, spelling, > or punctuation!

Go with you on the mirror as well - It's tiny, Paul > My other problem with the game was the mirror. It's too small, there are > some serious blind spots. I'd like to see maybe a wider view in the mirror > or one of those mirrors that are broke into sections where I could a little > more to the side of me. Maybe something like that could be put in a patch? > -Cota

Great stuff Cota - an excellant review of an excellant game. I've tried multiplayer on a lan and it's great especially on the longer courses (biased opinion here - I'm not a big fan of ovals.) Paul

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> Greetings, > Lets see if I can do a competent review of this game. Overall it's a > great game. It's sort of like an arcade racer wrapped around a very > realistic driving model. It looks like arcade but drives like a sim. > The main interface is simple. As is the garage and paint shop. A few > clicks is all it takes to get into the action. The garage isnt quite as > complex as other sims I've seen, but still offers plenty of adjustments. > There's aerodymanics, shock and spring settings, camber, toe, gear ratios, > final drives and more. The only thing it might lack for the serious sim > racer (which I am not) is individual wheel adjustments. You can only adjust > front and rear settings. I suppose for the oval tracks you might want to > adjust all four wheels different, but its fine for me. All of the > adjustments are broken into catagories and accesible by tabs on one page. A > rather neat feature is this window that shows in real time how the > adjustments you're making are going to affect your car. Take away front > spoiler and it shows that what you are doing is going add 'push' to your > car. From the garage, you can instantly go to the track to test your > adjustments. > The paint kit is pretty impressive. For the artists, it has a nice free > hand section and for the not-so artistic it has 20 or so templates where you > can change the colors. Decals and numbers are also available to add to your > car. > The career mode is just great. There are four classes to race in. You > start in amatuer and work your way up by winning the point championship at > the end of each season. Along the way you earn money (the better you finish > the better the purse) and can put that money toward upgrades. The upgrades > are as simple and cheap as a performance muffler up to ported cyllinder > heads and fuel injection systems. The class you're racing in determines what > upgrades are available. (Tip for begginers: go for the tires first) You dont > have to win every race to advance to the next class, you just have to win > the points race (again the better you finish the more points you get). It > took me four seasons to gradutate out of the amatuers and eight seasons I > think to make it to the pro class. > There are (I think) eight tracks all of which can be ran backwards for 16 > total. Two tracks are ovals the rest are road courses. The terrain for the > road courses range from fertile green to parched desert. They are slighty > reminescent (sp?) of Need for Speed tracks. No walls though, you can drive > anywhere on or off the tracks. Some are wide and fast, others tight and > narrow with lots of elevation changes. For me each track is a challenge and > requires a good line and proper car setup to be able drive fast. > Graphically the game is quite good. I wouldnt say absolutely stunning but > very good. The sounds are pretty decent and useful when determining if > you're pushing your car close to or over the 'edge'. > Physics! This is where the game shines. They are simply fantastic. I've > never driven a Viper (or any car at 180mph+) but it seems right on. You can > get loose and save it and you can get loose and lose it. With precise > throttle and steering you can even use it to your advantage. It's quite > incredible. Watching replays of your car is fun and informative. You can see > the front end dip when you shift and the chassis roll in high speed corners. > Outstanding! > AI... Im still not sure what to think of this yet. The AI drivers are fast > and drive good lines. I've lost more than one race though due to their > aggresiveness. They do crash and do so realistically and on occassion I've > seen them react to me. One example is, I had one guy on my ass for almost > two laps. It made me quite nervous, I was afraid he would take me out. Well, > one corner I got a little wide and he stuck his nose down underneath me. > "Its all over" I thought, he's gonna spin me. It was a right hand corner and > he was on my inside and a bit behind me. I held my line and since I had his > 'exit' covered he actually had to get out of the gas to avoid drifting up > into me and lost his momentum and fell quite a ways back because of it. > Other times though I swear they drive like I'm not even there and just > hammer into me. I've learned though that alot of crashes are your own fault > by not driving a smooth fast line. I suppose they dont have time to react to > your poor driving and a crash is the result. Anyway the AI at first seems > lacking but the more I watch them the more intelligent they seem. > Hmm... did I leave anything out? Multiplayer I've not tried yet so I cant > comment on that. I'll go on to my beefs with the game which arent many and > pretty petty. Oh one other thing I forgot, there's a clutch! I've never seen > a clutch in a driving game before. It very hard since I dont have a third > pedal or an easy to reach button on my T2 wheel. I tried but much like when > I first tried a manual shift so many years ago its very tricky. > Ok, first complaint is after driving in career mode and building up my > Viper to the monster it is now, going back to a 'quick' race and a stock > Viper is a drag. I'm curious how multiplayer works in this regard. I can see > how in multiplayer you'd probably want everyone on the same playing field as > far as their car goes though. Next is the shadows on some of the courses. > They are just painted onto the road it seems. A fantastic example of good > shadows is the SBK Superbike demo. Now those are shadows! MGI, check out > that demo and see how they're done. My last complaint is the lack of a > 'sense of speed'. It just doesnt seem quite right to me. There's one track > in particular that has a series of very tight S's. The first time I went > through them I felt like I was doing 15mph, I looked at my spedo and it said > 65! It certainly didnt look like I was doing 65. > Anyway, there's my thoughts on the game. I give it a 9 outa 10. Great! > Fantastic! Love it! Thanks MGI! Sierra: you're lucky you have these guys > writing for you. > -Cota > Disclaimer: Im not an english teacher and I didnt check grammar, spelling, > or punctuation!

I'd really like to see a track editor with it. I think id would make the game even more popular. Andre >Great review. I don't have my full copy yet but just from the demo these are a

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>few things I'd like to see in a patch. >1. higher resolution support past 1024x768 >2. ability to add more cars >3. ability to adjust your Field Of View ( to help the sense of speed) >4. a frame rate counter cheat code >5. ability to look back >6. shorter tracks?? (not sure on this one but from what ppl say the tracks

are >really long in Viper) >If you like my ideas send them to MGI!!!!!!! The more emails they get the more

Not neccissary, considering that the graphics are very good, but not intended to be photorealistic. You can see as far as you could ever need to, and IMHO the other cars are quite clear at present resolutions. While more cars may seem like a great idea, in reality there isn't any real benifit. Since cars are never out of the race (design decision that I think works well), more cars would end up crowding the track and making winning more of a randome chance event than a skill. The sence of speed actually is fairly real. Many games fake it to make you feel like your going faster. Not a real desprate thing, but surely a welcome addition In a real race you can not "look back", in VR you can use the camera views to see behind you. I do however feel that there are these little things called side mirrors that really ne to be added. There are short and long tracks. -- *** Support open DVD *** No phone line connection No charge for additional viewings No records of what you watch Cheaper to rent Cheaper to own DIVX: Watching you watch movies DIVX: You watch it, it watches you DIVX: Its hard to beleive it, but Bill Gates has nothing to do with it!

While that would be nice, considering the bargain price of $29 for the game, I don't begrudge them selling a few expansion sets before releasing the editor. Remember in VR the trakcs are not just pieces of asphalt. There are subtle bumps, banks and other surface variations that mean the editor would be more of a 3D rendering program than anything else. -- *** Support open DVD *** No phone line connection No charge for additional viewings No records of what you watch Cheaper to rent Cheaper to own DIVX: Watching you watch movies DIVX: You watch it, it watches you DIVX: Its hard to beleive it, but Bill Gates has nothing to do with it!

Good god man, have you no variety in you? Options, options, options!!!!! Come on.

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> > few things I'd like to see in a patch. > > 1. higher resolution support past 1024x768 > Not neccissary, considering that the graphics are very good, but not > intended to be photorealistic. You can see as far as you could ever need > to, and IMHO the other cars are quite clear at present resolutions.

You obviously don't have a TNT card or a 21 monitor. You are just plain wrong here. I'm currently playing with 19 cars in the VR demo. Its TONS more fun than 7. What the hell is so wrong with the option to add more? If you want 2 cars fine but the option to add 20 cars is a total blast. You are in the minority if you think the sense of speed is real in VR. Try that new 'race.bin' file in the demo. You'll see how nice it is to adjust the FOV. Why would you want to look in a tiny mirror when with the push of a button you could look backwards? Mirrors are too damn small. Again, options!!!!!! Fine add options for side mirrors too. But looking back for a split second is way better than any mirror can do. Well, thats good to hear. :)

Wait till you get to Pro class :) -Larry > You are in the minority if you think the sense of speed is real in VR. Try > that new 'race.bin' file in the demo. You'll see how nice it is to adjust > the FOV.